MQA is Vaporware

[firedog]

1 hour ago, DuckToller said:

 

If my reading skills are ok, these 424 millions are intended for the songwriters and publishing right holders, who aren't typically equal "the artists" performing the art.
Interesting part is the fact, that these are payments that are considered "as one of the conditions of eligibility for a specified limitation on liability for prior infringements" and will be controlled through the data supplied for distribution.
If I am not mistaken, the table provided with the document, is an indicator for the greatest infringements over the past (naturally led by the companies having the biggest customer base & the longest history mixed up with the companies having the worst payment behaviour). A liability limiting factor could be the problem to identify the correct rightsholder and arranging the transfer.

Looking at Tidal vs Qobuz, I would see some points to note:
A) According to Wikipedia "Tidal claims to pay the highest percentage of royalties to music artists and songwriters within the music streaming market."
B) Tidal has been accused of widely inflating subscriber numbers (also Wikipedia, citing TheVerge.com)
C) Qobuz "infringe" payment is the lowest of all "important" streaming services, Tidals payment however, even the company may have been around 3.5 times longer than Qobuz (2015 vs 05/2019), is at factor 65 compared to the 106k $ from Qobuz, assembled during a period of 22 month.

Taking into account factual information like A),B) and C), my tiny brain may conclude that A) can only be half the truth, because the royalities paid to songwriters have been obviously amassed in the past. No information about the artist gratifications were given, although A) is evidently correct when it comes to royalties paid to Beyonce and Kayne West.

Or is it MQA that inflated these infringments ???

That article is about these companies making up for past rip-offs (infringements is not paying royalites due) and is a way they can prevent being sued and having to pay even more. The total payment of Tidal, Qobuz, and other companies probably mostly reflects the amount of streaming, the country involved, and type, as some artists suffered more than others. 

 

I'd certainly disagree that songwriters aren't artists. Songwriters have lost the most from the switch to the new streaming royalty payment streams, and it's almost impossible to make a livng as a songwriter now. Even a hit song gets you a pittance in songwriting royalties, if it's based on streaming. 

 

[DuckToller]

3 hours ago, firedog said:

I'd certainly disagree that songwriters aren't artists.

I agree to agree with you, that my wording may have been imperfect. 😌

When I wrote "artists" performing the art, I've meant the musicians playing the song (vs. publisher and investment companies holding catalogues).

 

Songwriting is definitely an art form which has changed recently into more industrialized practice, i.E. the Song Machine. However, the royalities are organised separately from the "performing" artists, which is one of the reasons why some artists/performer/musicians are the face of success but remain poor while others -  owning the publishing rights as well - can sell their future royalities of the back catalogue to investment companies.

 

The interesting point is the geographical scope. Did you noticed more countries involved other than the US were specifically mentioned somewhere in that deal?

I've assumed that the payments were related to the USA only, due to jurisdiction, and felt it was underlined by the 5000$ per month from Qobuz, who are in this business in France since many years.

[Currawong]

On 2/17/2021 at 1:17 PM, Archimago said:

What we need these days is a slick YouTube video production with animations to show people the perspectives and reasons from the "Thanks, but no thanks, MQA." side. :-) @Fast and Bulbous, know anyone who wants to do this?!

 

I have a video on MQA in mind to do. I can't do animations though. I was simply going to use existing material available from places such as your web site.

 

On 2/17/2021 at 1:17 PM, Archimago said:

Darko is a salesman. He believes whatever the companies tell him to believe, be it expensive cables or promoting MQA. Of course, other audio magazines are like this as well...

 

This kind of personal attack is discouraging. Have you met John? Have you put to him the things about what he does that you disagree with? Have you even watched a significant number of his videos?

[Archimago]

4 hours ago, Currawong said:

 

I have a video on MQA in mind to do. I can't do animations though. I was simply going to use existing material available from places such as your web site.

 

Cool. Looking forward to it!

 

Quote

This kind of personal attack is discouraging. Have you met John? Have you put to him the things about what he does that you disagree with? Have you even watched a significant number of his videos?

 

I think this is simply being honest rather than a personal attack. What he does IMO is the equivalent of what a salesman would have done at the local brick & mortar store back in the day before the Internet; a "salesman" is a fine profession with certain understood characteristics that come with the job. There's little critical assessment of products here and it's clear over the years whether it's the assessment of MQA, stuff like the Dragonfly Cobalt, or skewed insistence on sonic difference between USB cables with tortured reasoning. It's certainly not investigative journalism.

 

Have not met him personally but in the old days have had back and forth comments before discussions shut down on his site (I think this goes back to 2013/2014). He knows what I think, I'm pretty sure.

 

Yes, I have viewed a number of his videos over the years and commented on them as well, along with a recent podcast he made with Lavorgna.

 

[R1200CL]

On 2/14/2021 at 7:55 PM, KeenObserver said:

Cancelling your subscription to Tidal will send a message. 

Well an indication is available here. Majority use Qobuz, almost twice compared to Tidal  

 

[R1200CL]

On 2/14/2021 at 9:07 PM, botrytis said:

Wehn I bought my first set of Audiophile speakers, I actually called the factory and talked to the designer. Even though he designed the speakers with bi-amp capability, he believed it didn't do anything. He put them in because customers wanted them. He basically talked me out of bi-amping the speakers and just use a good quality amp. We need more of this.

Now, this can be a nice topic for a new tread. 
Biamping and use of room correction SW can probably be very effective. 

[R1200CL]

On 2/17/2021 at 6:22 PM, The Computer Audiophile said:

This is 100% true. 

 

If the labels thought piracy would return because of MQA, they'd drop it in an instant. Piracy scares the hell out of them. 

 

If the labels thought they'd get bad PR because of MQA, they'd drop it in an instant. 

 

The success or failure of MQA has nothing to do with technology or music and everything to do with money. 

We could make an anti MQA campaign. Using adds. 
 

Mayby some should make a poll here about how much are you willing to pay in order to support such an advertisement ?

 

How much is needed ?

 

(I'm willing  to somewhere between $10 and $30)

[KeenObserver]

Didn't the government of Norway initiate an investigation into Tidal? Something to do with inflating numbers? Weren't Beyonce and Kanye West's albums reported to be playing something like 24 hours a day, seven days a week on every subscribers account, on two separate players?

What was the outcome of that investigation?

[Daccord]

On 2/14/2021 at 1:55 PM, KeenObserver said:

Cancelling your subscription to Tidal will send a message.

 

Only if they listen. When I cancelled my subscription I said I was doing it because they had replaced all my Warner favourites with MQA versions, A few days ago Tidal sent me an email offering a 12-month subscription at a $5 discount, with this incentive:

 

The Largest Master Quality Audio Catalog

Master Quality audio is the only format that guarantees music fans that they are listening to the original master recording – the highest quality available.

[bambadoo]

8 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

Didn't the government of Norway initiate an investigation into Tidal? Something to do with inflating numbers? Weren't Beyonce and Kanye West's albums reported to be playing something like 24 hours a day, seven days a week on every subscribers account, on two separate players?

What was the outcome of that investigation?

No idea about the outcome though. 

https://www.nme.com/news/music/norwegian-courts-approve-investigation-into-tidal-for-data-fraud-2688582

 

The report that was made was pretty "solid"

[Confused]

Mr Jabra outlining MQA's environmental credentials on Music:)ally TV...

 

https://musically.com/2021/02/16/the-case-for-sustainability-as-a-priority-for-the-music-industry/

[John Dyson]

16 minutes ago, Confused said:

Mr Jabra outlining MQA's environmental credentials on Music:)ally TV...

 

https://musically.com/2021/02/16/the-case-for-sustainability-as-a-priority-for-the-music-industry/

That article is sophistry and nonsense.   It is a bunch of disconnected ideas, trying to associate 'good things' with MQA.   The only real aspect of sustainability associated with MQA is maintaining a sustainable income for the license holders and further obscuring/paranoid-protecting the industry's intellectual property.   Apparently, the music industry is all about providing the lowest tolerable quality, maximum protection/obscuring IP at the expense of integrity.   There is NO WAY that what is normally being sold today is an accurate copy of the original production.  MQA makes it worse, unless you pay more license fees, and even that 'decoded' result is still inferior to a clean digital copy.   This 'clean' digital copy is already an obscured version of the original production (whether produced digitally or analog -- analog will have touched most consumer recordings, including  some DDD recordings that I have seen.)

 

MQA is simply an additional layer, that increases real, nowaday cost, lining pockets with siphoned off money -- and decreases the risk to the music industry by further obscuring their IP.   I see NO advantage to the consumer.

 

 

 

[Confused]

46 minutes ago, John Dyson said:

That article is sophistry and nonsense.   It is a bunch of disconnected ideas, trying to associate 'good things' with MQA.   The only real aspect of sustainability associated with MQA is maintaining a sustainable income for the license holders and further obscuring/paranoid-protecting the industry's intellectual property.   Apparently, the music industry is all about providing the lowest tolerable quality, maximum protection/obscuring IP at the expense of integrity.   There is NO WAY that what is normally being sold today is an accurate copy of the original production.  MQA makes it worse, unless you pay more license fees, and even that 'decoded' result is still inferior to a clean digital copy.   This 'clean' digital copy is already an obscured version of the original production (whether produced digitally or analog -- analog will have touched most consumer recordings, including  some DDD recordings that I have seen.)

 

MQA is simply an additional layer, that increases real, nowaday cost, lining pockets with siphoned off money -- and decreases the risk to the music industry by further obscuring their IP.   I see NO advantage to the consumer.

 

 

 

Indeed.  Plus there have been many posts in this thread and elsewhere pointing out that MQA is not that efficient in reducing bandwidth.  So if saving the planet is the main concern, then there are far more effective ways than MQA for achieving this.  

[KeenObserver]

Mike Jbara positioning himself and Warner as taking the moral high road is laughable.

It's like the revisionist history of South Africa where those responsible for Apartheid are portrayed as noble humanitarians whose only concern was for the welfare of the people.  It had nothing to do with enrichening themselves so that they could run Netherlands holding companies.

Has Jbara asked his financial backers about the true horrors of Apartheid?

[Allan F]

40 minutes ago, KeenObserver said:

Mike Jbara positioning himself and Warner as taking the moral high road is laughable.

It's like the revisionist history of South Africa where those responsible for Apartheid are portrayed as noble humanitarians whose only concern was for the welfare of the people.  It had nothing to do with enriching themselves so that they could run Netherlands holding companies.

Has Jbara asked his financial backers about the true horrors of Apartheid?

 

Nothing personal, but don't you think that a comparison in any way of the positioning of Mr. Jbara and Warner to the history of South Africa trivializes the latter? On any scale, the former is of virtually no importance or significance when weighed against the "true horrors of Apartheid".

[KeenObserver]

7 minutes ago, Allan F said:

 

Nothing personal, but don't you think that a comparison in any way of the positioning of Mr. Jbara and Warner to the history of South Africa trivializes the latter? On any scale, the former is of virtually no importance or significance when weighed against the "true horrors of Apartheid".

 

It is not trivializing anything. It is pointing out the truth and it is pointing out who is actually backing MQA.

Those involved in creating and furthering Apartheid would like that part of history to be forgotten. There is an effort to gloss over the history and create a new revisionist version of history.  THAT is trivializing history.

The TRUTH should be shown.

Forcing MQA on the music consumer is not unlike forcing contaminated brandy on the workers. Compared to the effects of Apartheid it is trivial, but to the audiophile it is important. At what point is enough enough.

[Allan F]

15 minutes ago, KeenObserver said:

 

It is not trivializing anything. It is pointing out the truth and it is pointing out who is actually backing MQA.

Those involved in creating and furthering Apartheid would like that part of history to be forgotten. There is an effort to gloss over the history and create a new revisionist version of history.  THAT is trivializing history.

The TRUTH should be shown.

Forcing MQA on the music consumer is not unlike forcing contaminated brandy on the workers. Compared to the effects of Apartheid it is trivial, but to the audiophile it is important. At what point is enough enough.

 

With respect, of course you are trivializing the history of Apartheid when, in the same post, you compare it to the musings of Mr Jbara. It's not unlike when people compare government policies they disagree with to Hitler and the Holocaust. The two have no business in the same discussion. The fact that something may be true does not elevate its relative importance in the overall scheme of things. In any case, this is off topic so I will not comment any further on this issue.

[KeenObserver]

1 minute ago, Allan F said:

With respect, of course you are trivializing the history of Apartheid when, in the same post, you compare it the the musings of Mr Jbara. It's not unlike when people compare government policies they disagree with to Hitler and the Holocaust. The two have no business in the same discussion. The fact that something may be true does not elevate its relative level of importance in the overall scheme of things.

 

Do you actually know the source of the financial backers of MQA?  Do you know where the Billions originated?

[KeenObserver]

Those that cannot learn from history...

[UkPhil]

Jeez 

Guess what’s wrong with this  advertising campaign, answers on a postcard please, the cheek of it 

[botrytis]

 

Well, if you tell a lie long enough, people think it is the truth........

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

52 minutes ago, UkPhil said:

Jeez 

Guess what’s wrong with this  advertising campaign, answers on a postcard please, the cheek of it 

That’s quite a reduction in bandwidth. From uncompressed WAV at 9216 kbps to proprietary MQA at, wait for it, 9216 kbps. I can feel the globe starting to cool and the winds calming. 

[David Wiblin]

9 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

That’s quite a reduction in bandwidth. From uncompressed WAV at 9216 kbps to proprietary MQA at, wait for it, 9216 kbps. I can feel the globe starting to cool and the winds calming. 

 

Ooo . . . I just know I'm setting myself up for a beat-down here but isn't that poster referring to the unpacked bit rate (9216) and not the MQA container transmission rate (of say 1200kbps)? 

[The Computer Audiophile]

10 minutes ago, David Wiblin said:

 

Ooo . . . I just know I'm setting myself up for a beat-down here but isn't that poster referring to the unpacked bit rate (9216) and not the MQA container transmission rate (of say 1200kbps)? 

Don’t worry about beat-downs from this crowd :~)

 

How can MQA be unpacked to 9216 kbps without 24 bits and 192 kHz worth of information? Remember, it’s lossy and can’t recover it all. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Just so we’re all on the same page. 
 

 

24 bits per sample x 192,000 samples per second = 4,608,000 bits per second x 2 channels = 9,216,000 (9216 kbps) bits per second of stereo.